A major environmental problem centers around the disposal of various waste materials. These include radioactive wastes from nuclear fission processes, and particularly low level wastes such as those obtained from the aqueous evaporators in a nuclear power plant, used ion-exchange resins and filter materials such as clays and diatomaceous earth. These wastes may be in the form of aqueous solutions, dispersions or slurries. One method of disposing of these wastes which has proven to be quite satisfactory is described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,077,901. The process comprises the encapsulation of these waste materials in vinyl ester resins or in unsaturated polyester resins or in mixtures of these two types of resins.
The problem of waste disposal has intensified due to the costs of the incorporating materials, extreme difficulty in obtaining burial space, and the criticality of effecting uniform encapsulation of radioactive waste materials so as to avoid hot spots which lead to increased transportation and burial costs of such encapsulated wastes. Added to the foregoing is the increased complexity and variety of aqueous liquid wastes.